Fashion Designers at Home

AD revisits the exclusive homes of industry icons

Donna Karan

“I wondered, How can I bring Bali three and a half hours away?” says fashion mogul Donna Karan (inset, with daughter Gabrielle), who envisioned a simple, modern beach house on Parrot Cay, in the Turks and Caicos Islands. Architects and interior designers Enrico Bonetti and Dominic Kozerski collaborated with architect Cheong Yew Kuan to create the complex—“a marriage of East and West,” Karan says—which includes three villas and three open-air pavilions. “It’s a sanctuary where I go to create awareness. Three hours from New York, I have this amazing cocoon of serenity that reminds me of the two places on the planet where I feel happiest: Africa and Bali.” Pictured: In a pavilion, as throughout, sliding doors and glazed walls minimize the boundaries between the interiors and the landscape. “Just being a part of nature, a guest of nature, was the most important key,” remarks Karan. (December 2009)